Wildlife Agency Considers Open Season on Protected Black Vultures

Southern Cattlemen Say the Aggressive Birds Are Devastating Livestock

By Sarah Okeson

Black vulture pair feeding on a mule deer. Plate 106 from The Birds of America by John James Audubon.

Southern farmers and cattle ranchers want the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to issue a broad order allowing them to kill protected black vultures, which they say are devastating herds from Georgia to Texas.

To get a permit, applicants must explain what nonlethal measures they’ve tried and why they didn’t work. Cattle ranchers and others want more leeway to be able to kill what they say can be problem birds. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has previously issued orders for people to be able to kill birds such as Canada geese.

The Oklahoma Department of Agriculture, Food & Forestry estimated that Oklahoma ranchers lost more than $30,000 worth of livestock to black vultures in 2015. Tennessee livestock producers reported losses of 233 cattle to black vultures in 2015.

In India, the number of vultures crashed from about 40 million to less than 100,000 because of a drug given to cattle that poisoned the vultures. The populations of rats and feral dogs grew. So did the number of rabies deaths among humans.